Given that most aspects of the magical mythos are quite unprovable to the skeptical inquirer, there is a strong temptation to write off the whole worldview as a swamp of delusion, and some historians of the occult, such as James Webb and Ellic Howe, have taken this approach.
At least two factors lead me to suggest that readers withhold judgement until engaging in further study themselves. First, the worldview and symbolic universe of Western Magic is fundamentally the same as that of other forms of Western esotericism: Hermeticism, Alchemy, esoteric Freemasonry, Theosophy, and Rosicrucianism. While details and metaphors may differ from system to system, they share the same teachings far more often than not. If the reader has a working familiarity with one of those disciplines — and sees value in it — chances are that further investigations of High Magic will find value there as well.
